The Welsummer Thread!!!!

[Nickeyo]

Wow. What a difference. From the reading I have done (albeit it is a bit limited and geared to utility birds) in europe the prefer the really dark eggs. Take a look at this PDF and see the differences between European, and NA birds http://www.aviculture-europe.nl/nummers/12E05A10.pdf

yes here in england the darker the egg the better.
My welsummer hen is an excellent flier and is quiet capable of getting on my garage roof.
I find my welsummer lays very dark eggs and quiet a few of them, though this is only her 1st proper season, she layed only 5-6 last year but has now got in the swing, shes just had a break for moult

 

[Weirdness555]

Hey, where abouts are you? We're planning to get welsummers so a chicken friend with some would be good

 

[faykokoWV]

Trust me, I know I've put a lot of effort into making sure I maintain a dark egg as part of my breeding program!!

 

[Kikwi]

But aren't there some traits you'll lose if you don't breed for them, like the yellow legs? I'm not very versed in the genetics department but from my understanding yellow legs aren't the dominant trait so it would be easy to lose if you don't specifically breed for it in your line?

Can't say much about the rest, but someone recently posted in another thread (sorry don't feel like digging for it) a link to a proper scientific paper showing that yellow is dominant.

 

[Happy Chooks]

Trust me, I know I've put a lot of effort into making sure I maintain a dark egg as part of my breeding program!!

Ditto! Egg color is very important to me as well. It's what sets the breed apart and brings interest to them.

 

[Happy Chooks]

Quote: Yes, white legs are dominant to yellow - so you can easily lose leg color.

 

[maryhysong]

Yes, white legs are dominant to yellow - so you can easily lose leg color.

as seen in three out of four pullets that were part of the Wellies given to me and three out of four pullets I hatched. Sooo many white legs ;-( And of course the otherwise best looking pullet had white legs.

Trying again. Was given a pretty nice pullet, her legs are pale but they are yellow and she is laying a pretty dark freckled egg. And I have some in the bator from Erhard. fingers crossed

 

[Anniebee]

Wondering if someone could shed some light on a few issues with my one Welsummer. I am bordering on stressing out at this point ... but in thinking clearly, maybe I shouldn't be ... anyway - here goes.

1) My girl ( Mandy Welsummer ) is a very very large chicken.

2) She has been moulting ( Victoria, Australia ) since very early winter, and still seems to be losing feathers, although her backside has grown back some nice down. It is now well into Spring.
One side of her feather loss has returned, but the other side ( under the left wing ) has not ... she is quite bare there. To me she has been having a hard time during a very slow moult.

3) She is approx. 13 months old, and for 7 months, has been 'spraying' large quantities of poop with a great deal of liquid in it, once she's allowed out of their coop in the morning.

4) Her overnight droppings where she sleeps are perfectly shaped and very normal.

5) The colour of her eggs has dropped off - to a very mild terra-cotta - almost a lightish tan.

6) On a few occasions recently, she has mewed and softly clucked while sitting, but has produced nothing. Today she did the same thing.

7) She has laid one extremely oddly shaped egg recently - which ( believe it or not ) has wrinkles in the shell - obviously the wrinkles happened somewhere along the line and the shell hardened retaining those wrinkles ... it is the strangest looking egg - and very very big, with one side kind of flattened. I think she had a really hard time with that one.

8 ) I have been giving her and her friend Molly ( an RIR ) some extra black oily sunflower seeds to help her lay eggs.

9 ) She is laying about 1 egg every 2 - 3 days now, but has been laying 6 out of 7 days all through the winter ??? ..

10) She eats like a pig, and I wonder if I am overfeeding her with my own recipe mash ( good chicken stuff ) 3 times a week, plus their layer pellets all day, and free ranging. Is overfeeding possible ?

11) I don't think she has gone broody as she is off the nest way too often for that.

12) Her comb remains bright red, although today I noticed it was ever so slightly paler than usual. ( I believe combs can brighten and lessen in colour depending on a variety of things ). Not too worried about that.

Main question .... is she behaving like Welsummers do on occasion, or have I reason to be concerned. I had a feel around her vent late this afternoon - and she doesn't seem to have anything stuck ( like a large egg ) there. She does tend to lay whoppers when she lays.

Her behaviour is still normal - for her. She is an aggressive bird, and would kill my little Aussie Araucana, given half the chance. She's had a couple of opportunities to do that, and has had a really nasty go at her. ( because Mindy Araucana grew her wings back, and flew over the run separation, into Mandy's run ( wings now re-clipped ), and on another occasion got out of her run to join the others free ranging which was a very big mistake on Mindy's part ).

Just wondering ..... has anyone any ideas - particularly about Welsummer behaviour and whether they can get too big, and try to lay eggs too large ?

Thanks in anticipation for any thoughts on the subject ...

Cheers ............ AB

 

[Kikwi]

Yellow is dominant to white.

THE INHERITANCE OF SHANK COLOR IN CHICKENS
C. W. KNOX
Bureau of Animal Industry, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, D. C.
Received March 15,1935
http://www.genetics.org/content/20/6/529.full.pdf
----------------------------
Poultry Genetics For Small and Backyard Flocks: An Introduction

Small and Backyard Flocks October 12, 2012
http://www.extension.org/pages/6536...backyard-flocks:-an-introduction#.Ukb89MXD-00
---------------------------
Chickens / Genetics Mini-Series
GMS10: Skin and Shank Color

Posted on September 2, 2012 by Heather Nicholson Skin and Shank Color Genetics Mini-Series Article #10
http://scratchcradle.wordpress.com/2012/09/02/gms10-skin-and-shank-color/

Best Regards,
Karen
in western PA, USA

Found that post on leg color genetics.

 

[ChickNmamma]

Wondering if someone could shed some light on a few issues with my one Welsummer. I am bordering on stressing out at this point ... but in thinking clearly, maybe I shouldn't be ... anyway - here goes.

1) My girl ( Mandy Welsummer ) is a very very large chicken.

2) She has been moulting ( Victoria, Australia ) since very early winter, and still seems to be losing feathers, although her backside has grown back some nice down. It is now well into Spring.
One side of her feather loss has returned, but the other side ( under the left wing ) has not ... she is quite bare there. To me she has been having a hard time during a very slow moult.

3) She is approx. 13 months old, and for 7 months, has been 'spraying' large quantities of poop with a great deal of liquid in it, once she's allowed out of their coop in the morning.

4) Her overnight droppings where she sleeps are perfectly shaped and very normal.

5) The colour of her eggs has dropped off - to a very mild terra-cotta - almost a lightish tan.

6) On a few occasions recently, she has mewed and softly clucked while sitting, but has produced nothing. Today she did the same thing.

7) She has laid one extremely oddly shaped egg recently - which ( believe it or not ) has wrinkles in the shell - obviously the wrinkles happened somewhere along the line and the shell hardened retaining those wrinkles ... it is the strangest looking egg - and very very big, with one side kind of flattened. I think she had a really hard time with that one.

8 ) I have been giving her and her friend Molly ( an RIR ) some extra black oily sunflower seeds to help her lay eggs.

9 ) She is laying about 1 egg every 2 - 3 days now, but has been laying 6 out of 7 days all through the winter ??? ..

10) She eats like a pig, and I wonder if I am overfeeding her with my own recipe mash ( good chicken stuff ) 3 times a week, plus their layer pellets all day, and free ranging. Is overfeeding possible ?

11) I don't think she has gone broody as she is off the nest way too often for that.

12) Her comb remains bright red, although today I noticed it was ever so slightly paler than usual. ( I believe combs can brighten and lessen in colour depending on a variety of things ). Not too worried about that.

Main question .... is she behaving like Welsummers do on occasion, or have I reason to be concerned. I had a feel around her vent late this afternoon - and she doesn't seem to have anything stuck ( like a large egg ) there. She does tend to lay whoppers when she lays.

Her behaviour is still normal - for her. She is an aggressive bird, and would kill my little Aussie Araucana, given half the chance. She's had a couple of opportunities to do that, and has had a really nasty go at her. ( because Mindy Araucana grew her wings back, and flew over the run separation, into Mandy's run ( wings now re-clipped ), and on another occasion got out of her run to join the others free ranging which was a very big mistake on Mindy's part ).

Just wondering ..... has anyone any ideas - particularly about Welsummer behaviour and whether they can get too big, and try to lay eggs too large ?

Thanks in anticipation for any thoughts on the subject ...

Cheers ............ AB

Hi there,

Just one thing popped out when reading this - birds can get too much fat around their vent to lay easily. I would cut out the BOSS - it tends to go straight to fat. I was reading on another thread where somebody had a hen that was laying fewer and fewer eggs and finally quit. That person was of the old school thought that when a hen quits laying its time to eat them (even though the bird was not that old), so she processed the bird and found almost two cups of fat around the vent area - and an egg behind all that fat. The bird could not push the egg through the fat, so it just left it there. She had felt the hen before processing and was unable to feel the egg or the fat at that time. This bird was also a pig on her food - and would eat and eat and was huge, much larger than others of her breed.

Perhaps in the winter time your girl was using the BOSS to supplement the body fat and using the energy to keep her warm, but now that fat is going to storage - which is in the back end there. Put her on a diet - let her get more of her food free-ranging and move that fat out of storage. Hopefully that will get her back in shape and lessen the chance of internal laying or blockage.